"White is the Colour" -- Vancouver's NASL Success

With the news that Steve Nash and Greg Kerfoot are seriously pushing an upcoming MLS slot for the Vancouver Whitecaps', Canadian soccer fans must be wondering what year it is. After all, it was 1978 when Vancouver saw a record crowd of 30, 811 fans arrive at Empire Stadium to watch a first-round NASL playoff game against the Toronto Metro-Croatia.

The game was not without controversy; the Metro-Croatia filed an official protest at NASL's head office in New York over Vancouver's second of four goals. Players complained that Toronto keeper Zeljko Bilecki had been obstructed, Sol Campbell-on-Ricardo style, by the Whitecaps' forwards. However, Toronto deserved the loss -- their attack, much like Toronto FC's these days, had no coherence and was incapable of threatening the Vancouver goal.

Yet there it was: the first cross-Canada soccer rivalry to spark massive local interest. For Vancouver, the prospect of playing a team from Toronto, NASL champions only two-years earlier, was enough to spark the imagination of the city, and the game produced the largest attendance ever for a game between two Canadian teams. Even though Vancouver would go out in the next round, the Whitecaps were on the eve of tremendous popular and sporting success.

Ah the Seventies. Couldn't be a team unless you had a record.

They would go on to win the 1979 SoccerBowl in thrilling fashion, producing many sold out games along the way and raising soccer's status on Canada's west-coast. The team also nurtured homegrown players like Bob Lenarduzzi and Glen Johnston, and paved the way for Canadian Soccer League powerhouse the Vancouver 86ers. They also likely had a hand in getting a certain basketball prodigy and his brother interested in the sport. Hopefully, we can look forward to a proper league reprise of the '78 game in a few years.